Less than two months into his tenure as Ontario’s premier and Doug Ford has hit the ground running. Where he might be running to, though, is another question entirely.
This week, the PCs announced they were abandoning the Liberals’ government-run cannabis stores (which were basically LCBOs for weed) in favour of letting the private sector handle the retail store fronts while the province handles the online sales side.
As a man in his mid-40s, I’ve many friends who either used to smoke weed or still do. I’ve asked many of the ones who still smoke how they felt about the Liberal plan. Almost all of them said, and I quote, “I won’t buy government weed.”
Perhaps buying pot from “the Man” just doesn’t sit right with their rebel souls. I don’t know. What I do know is that is a common opinion among people I know. I imagine the opinion is not that unusual among cannabis users.
Either way, I like the idea of letting the private sector into the marijuana market. It creates a whole new business sector, avoids an unnecessary government monopoly and encourages entrepreneurship, all good things as far as I’m concerned.
The private sector will still be purchasing weed from a government-controlled wholesaler (the Ontario Cannabis Stores). Coupled with the sales tax on the weed itself, that’s a good chunk of new money — billions of it most likely — flowing into government coffers.
Hopefully, Greater Sudbury won’t use the opt-out option the province has built into its legislation that allows municipalities a one-time occasion to ban retail cannabis sales. Sudburians should be able to get in on, and profit from, this new industry.
But even as the province made what I thought was a positive move, Ford and members of his cabinet — for reasons that remain murky to me — waded into a decision by Victoria, B.C., to remove a statue of Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald, from its city hall. They offered to take the statue off Victoria’s hands and give it a home in Ontario.
Was this pure virtue-signaling to that segment of the Tory base that feels viewing Canada’s history through a modern lens is an assault on tradition? Was this trolling their left-wing opponents by adopting a position the Tories knew would get under their skin in a big way? Was this directed at Indigenous communities for whom John A. (as architect of the residential school system among other disastrous policies for First Nations) is far from a revered figure? Was it a messy mix of all of this?
The whole situation seemed petty.
Similarly, Ford’s decision to go after Toronto’s city council, by cutting the number of councilors from 47 to 25. Again, it seemed a petty attack against an institution he was once a part of, but not really. He cast himself in the role of outsider when he was on city council.
Ford claims the cut fulfilled the public’s wish for smaller government, which is just nonsense. He knows darn well — or should know — that “small government” means less bureaucracy, not less representation. And that’s exactly what the residents of Canada’s largest city will now have: a much smaller voice in the halls of power. That’s not good for democracy and it’s terrible for the people of Toronto.
Of course, as the legitimate press scrutinizes Ford’s decisions, he’s decided to fight the press, too. I’m referring, of course, to the premier’s new propaganda wing, the social media account Ontario News Now (ONN). I'm not providing a link to that account.
There should be scare-quotes around the “News” in that name.
News is objective, critical and informative. The ONN is none of those things. It’s a government cheerleader. It’s pure propaganda, selling the party message while disguising itself as news. If it wasn’t so amateurish, I would say the ONN is positively Orwellian.
What’s more, Ford is using our own money — taxpayer money — on an initiative that both delegitimizes actual news media and sells an image of Ford that’s only positive. It’s public relations masquerading as news. And it’s gross.
Don’t be fooled by the ONN’s fake reporters and fake reports. Fake news? This is it.
Doug Ford is politician like any other, but his strategy (or at least the strategy being employed by the people he’s hired to come up with a strategy) seems to be to create a cult of personality around him. That should disturb us.
I wrote earlier that Ford hit the ground running when he became premier. And he did. But the way he and his government have been ping-ponging from issue to issue, while attempting to control the message by creating a propaganda arm, makes me think he’s working without a road map.
And that should make us all very nervous.
Mark Gentili is the editor of Sudbury.com and Northern Life.
